The business of systems integration

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Bibliographic Information

The business of systems integration

edited by Andrea Prencipe, Andrew Davies, and Mike Hobday

Oxford University Press, 2005

  • : pbk.

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Includes bibliographical references and index

Description and Table of Contents

Description

Over the past decade or so, systems integration has become a key factor in the operations, strategy and competitive advantage of major corporations in a wide variety of sectors (e.g. computing, automotive, telecommunications, military systems and aerospace). Systems integration is a strategic task that pervades business management not only at the technical level but also at the management and strategic levels. This book shows how and why this new kind of systems integration has evolved into an emerging model of industrial organization whereby firms, and groups of firms, join together different types of knowledge, skill and activity, as well as hardware, software, and human resources to produce new products for the marketplace. This book is the first to systematically explore systems integration from a business and innovation perspective. Contributors delve deeply into the nature, dimensions and dynamics of the new systems integration, deploying research and analytical techniques from a wide variety of disciplines including, the theory of the firm, the history of technology, industrial organization, regional studies, strategic management, and innovation studies. This wealth of research capability provides deep insights into the new model of systems integration and supports this with an abundance of empirical evidence. The book is organized in three main parts. The first part focuses on the history of systems integration. Contributors trace the early history of systems integration using different industrial examples. The second part presents theoretical and analytical aspects of systems integration. Contributions concentrate on the regulatory and cognitive features of systems integration, the relationships between systems integration and regional competitive advantage, and the way in which systems integration supports the competitive advantage of firms. The third part takes industry and firm-level approaches. Contributions focus on different sectors and highlight the specificity of systems integration in various industrial domains, stressing its importance for systems integration in the case of complex capital goods, such as aircraft and telecommunications equipment, as well as consumer goods, such as personal computers and automobiles.

Table of Contents

  • Preface
  • 1. Introduction
  • PART I: THE HISTORY OF SYSTEMS INTEGRATION
  • 2. Inventing Systems Integration
  • 3. Systems Integration and the Social Solution of Technical Problems in Complex Systems
  • 4. Integrating Electrical Power Systems: From Individual to Organizational Capabilities
  • 5. Specialization and Systems Integration: Where Manufacture and Services Still Meet
  • PART II: THEORETICAL AND CONCEPTUAL PERSPECTIVES ON SYSTEMS INTEGRATION
  • 6. The Economics of Systems Integration: Towards an Evolutionary Interpretation
  • 7. Corporate Strategy and Systems Integration Capabilities: Managing Networks in Complex Systems Industries
  • 8. The Role of Technical Standard in Coordinating the Division of Labour in Complex Systems Industries
  • 9. The Cognitive Basis of System Integration: Redundancy of Context Generating Knowledge
  • 10. Towards a Dynamics of Modularity: A Cyclical Model of Technical Advance
  • PART III: COMPETITIVE ADVANTAGE AND SYSTEMS INTEGRATION
  • 11. The Geography of Systems Integration
  • 12. Modularity and Outsourcing: The Nature of Co-Evolution of Product Architecture and Organization Architecture in the Global Automotive Industry
  • 13. Modularization in the Car Industry: Inter-Linked Multiple Hierarchies of Product, Production, and Supplier Systems
  • 14. Systems Integration in the US Defence Industry: Who Does It and Why Is It Important?
  • 15. Changing Boundaries of Innovation Systems: Linking Market Demand and Use
  • 16. Integrated Solutions: The Changing Business of Systems Integration

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